Barre photographer captures a living portrait of Croatia

Reflecting on living in Croatia from 2008-11, Barre photographer Shayne Beschta recalled, “I have never experienced such warmth and hospitality being an American abroad.”

So why then did she become a thief? Albeit a good thief.

“The Good Thief: An American Photographer in Croatia” is the name of Beschta's photography exhibition at the Worcester Public Library through the end of February.

“It's just a kind of tongue-in-cheek reference,” Beschta said of the title. “I really slink around as a photographer, just snatching these little scenes. But I was hoping I was a benign snatcher. It was an homage to the place I had made home for three years, so it was done with love and admiration.”

As was immediately apparent when talking with Beschta at the library last week while viewing her exhibition, she chooses her images and her words carefully, and there are other levels and meanings in both.

“The Good Thief” consists of two collections of photographs taken while she was in Croatia during her husband's U.S. State Department posting there — “The Mirogoj Angel Photographic Series,” striking pictures of statues of angels at a large memorial in Zagreb, Croatia's capital, and “In the Intimate Distance.”

While previously exhibited in Croatia, the current showing at the Worcester Public Library is the first time the photographs in “The Good Thief” have been on display in the U.S.

Croatia is a country of nearly 4.3 million people that straddles Central Europe and the Balkans and has a sometimes troubling history.

“In the Intimate Distance” has photographs that depict stone houses, wooden shutters and cobbled streets in villages and towns that seem to come from a distant time, except you also see TV antennas and electrical wires and clothes on a washing line. There are some people in the photographs as well (viewed from a distance), but they are mostly looking away from the photographer or have their backs to her.

There is “a vibrant culture that goes on beyond these ancient facades,” Beschta said. Yet as the photographs might suggest, she didn't feel part of it. Hers was the isolation and loneliness of an expatriate. She has stated, “I can appreciate, I can admire — but I am on the outside, stealing little bits of lives led by others.”

Beschta said the isolation certainly wasn't the result of any anti-Americanism from the Croatians she met or any desire they had to be to be exclusive. “We just didn't have that history — that personal history passed down from granddaughter to granddaughter.”

One photograph has “a tiny joke,” Beschta said. Looking down from a high perch on the famous walls of Dubrovnik, the camera takes in the historical sights of the ancient city, but in a small alleyway two people — two tiny images — seem to be facing the photographer. “And I'm sure they're photographing me,” Beschta said.

Although Beschta took a photography class (her first) as an undergraduate at Grinnell College in Iowa, she didn't become serious about taking photographs as an artist until she spent two years living in Cameroon in Western Africa from 2000-2002.

Significantly, given her thoughtful use of words, Beschta had earned an MFA in creative writing from Columbia University before marrying Derek Westfall. Two months after the wedding, the State Department sent Westfall, accompanied by his wife, to Cameroon. The couple, who now have two children, have also lived in Vancouver, Canada, and in the Virginia suburbs of Washington, D.C., (when Westfall is working stateside). Last summer, Westfall was posted to Afghanistan, so for the duration of his stay there, Beschta has moved with her children back to the home of her parents in Barre.

“Ironically, I was one of those kids who never wanted to leave Barre,” Beschta said of growing up. But her far-flung travels inspired her to pick up a camera.

“I was in this amazing landscape,” she said of Cameroon. But it was one she also felt would soon “disappear from the world.” At that point using film (she has since switched mostly to digital) she tried to photograph the “beautiful, difficult, amazing life,” she saw. But when she got the pictures back, they were “lifeless,” Beschta acknowledged. “That's when I decided I should figure out what I'm doing.”

Help came from an unusual source. “I should credit chimpanzees with helping develop my skills,” Beschta said.

She became interested in a sanctuary for orphaned chimpanzees, and started photographing them. “They are damned hard to photograph. I put in a lot of hours to capture their faces and antics. If you can capture chimpanzees, you can probably capture anything.”

However, “They're so incredibly human in our best sense. I started taking what I realized were portraits of them.”

When these photographs came back, “I was very pleased with where I saw life and a dynamic quality.”

After Cameroon, Beschta and her husband lived for a while in Vancouver. “That was a period where I was still trying to shore up my technical skills (as a photographer),” Beschta said. Living in suburban Virginia, Beschta started a small custom portrait photography business. “It went really well in that I was able to work. I love photographing children and families.”

Then came Croatia. “I will confess that when I found out we were going there, I did have to look on a map.”

Over the centuries, Croatia was a sovereign nation, went into union with Hungary, and was part of the Habsburg Empire. The 20th century wrought great turmoil, with Croatia briefly in the control of pro-Nazi fascists during World War II, then becoming part of the federal communist state of Yugoslavia. Croatia broke from Yugoslavia in 1991, but fought a bitter conflict with the Serbia-dominated Yugoslav National Army. In 1992, Croatia received diplomatic recognition by the European Economic Community and subsequently the United Nations. It is now a democratic parliamentary republic.

Through it all, Croatia has remained remarkably homogenous. Over 90 percent of the population is ethnic Croats and Roman Catholics.

“It's the kind of Europe that disappeared 100 years ago,” Beschta said. Land has been in the same hands for generations and generations. “It's quite a beautiful way of life that I was privileged to witness,” she said. But there is also both a “fierce national pride” and “a lot of feelings of being misunderstood.” To the visitor, such feelings may be withheld — distant, private.

The Mirogoj Cemetery in Zagreb is a large cemetery/ memorial/ museum/ park that can be a festive as well as reflective and respectful area, Beschta said. Families picnic there; they also tend to the graves of relatives. The area is “brimming” with angel statues. Beschta became a regular visitor.

In her description of the collection of photographs for the series she states, “I realized I was searching for the same elusive quality in those statues of stone that I've always looked for as a portrait photographer; the moment when someone, caught unawares, lets a part of her life story illuminate her face.”

Beschta said she saw that the angels “aren't perfect and glorious, they're decaying and aging. I hope that I'm conveying that tension between beauty and imperfection. Or maybe the beauty of imperfection.”

For more information about photographer Shayne Beschta, visit www.photosbyshayne.com.